my fingertips and my lips, they burn from the cigarettes
by theyellowumbrella
Summary: Beca tastes like smoke when she kisses. This thing they're doing—making out behind the bike sheds like they've been ripped straight out of some YA romance novel and feeling each other up in the darkness of Beca's garage under the pretense of needing somewhere quiet to study—isn't technically dating, so she doesn't feel like she has the right to make a comment on it.


**Continuing with my transfers. One more story to go!**

 **TW: smoking! (note: my thoughts mirror Aubrey's, not Beca, Chloe or Stacie's).**

* * *

Beca tastes like smoke when she kisses.

Which, okay, granted, shouldn't have been that big of a surprise when she saw the leather jacket and the scary ear spikes and the multiple layers of black eyeliner, and like, it's not uncommon for people their age to smoke, but she's just like… really taken aback by the fact that Beca smokes.

And it's not like she's complaining or anything—definitely not, because it gives their kisses this aftertaste that lingers for hours after Beca's gone and she really really loves it—but she just can't over it.

It's probably because she's always seen Beca as somewhat of a puppy, with the face-cracking grins she tries her best to bite back and the way she gets all nervous and jittery whenever Chloe speaks to her for an extended period of time, or when she shows off one of her new mixes. Beca's always been this enigma to everyone else; tough and sharp and messy, but she's always just been… Beca to Chloe, and the thought of seeing her as anything other than a tiny, excitable animal is foreign to her.

This thing they're doing—making out behind the bike sheds like they've been ripped straight out of some YA romance novel and feeling each other up in the darkness of Beca's garage under the pretense of needing somewhere quiet to study—isn't technically dating, so she doesn't feel like she has the right to make a comment on it.

So, she keeps quiet and enjoys it the best she can.

Until a few weeks later when they're crammed into Stacie's bedroom, textbooks covering every surface possible and Beca lying back on Stacie's bed, her biology book covering her face in the most dramatic way she can muster.

"Oh my God," she whines, letting out a low groan. "Kill me. I'm serious, kill me now. Aubrey, you've always wanted to. Take your shot. I'm serious."

Aubrey raises her eyebrows a little at Beca but says nothing, only giving her a small smile, quickly returning to reading the textbook propped up on her lap.

"You're so dramatic, Becs," Chloe says, grinning at the younger girl.

"I haaate you, Chloe. Stop mocking me."

"I'm sorry," Chloe says, not trying in a the slightest to conceal her smile. "Here, Bec, to make it up to you, how about I get you some gum?"

She moves the textbook from it's position covering her face and squints at Chloe. "Gum? How is that supposed to comfort me?"

"Dunno," she says, shrugging. "Better than nothing."

"'Kay. There's some in my bag."

Chloe drags Beca's bag over to her chair and unzips it carelessly, rifling through it to find the gum. She finds a box and after turning it over in her hands for a few seconds she decides it's most likely the gum she's gone in search of and pulls it out without taking a look at what it actually is.

And of course, it just so happens to be a small box of cigarettes.

She lets out a squeak loud enough to catch the attention of the other three girls in the room, who all promptly turn their heads in sync to look at her. It'd probably be funny if she wasn't in so much shock.

(Even though she really shouldn't be shocked, what with the way her mouth pretty much always tastes the way her Uncle Mark's breath smells.

Except like, way hotter).

Beca flushes a little when she sees what Chloe's holding—certainly not a pack of gum—and tries to hide her face under the textbook again, but Aubrey's already yanked it off of her before she can go back into hiding.

"Beca Mitchell!" she exclaims, almost a yell, and Beca groans.

"What?" she asks, muffling her voice with her arm, which she has smacked across her mouth.

"You smoke?" she asks. "Smoking kills, you know!"

And then Aubrey goes off on one about all of the dangers of smoking, but all Chloe can really think about is how hot Beca must look with a cigarette in her mouth, balanced between her teeth and lightly stained by that lip colour shiny lipgloss Beca pretends not to wear.

She's always thought of smoking as gross and people who were attracted to smokers as even grosser, but now, she's reconsidering that.

Just a little.

(She's not sure what her reaction will be when (if) she actually sees Beca smoking, but she assumes that she'll melt into a puddle right there with all of the hotness).

"I dunno," she mumbles sheepishly when Aubrey asks her 'what the hell was going through her thick, thick brain when she put that death trap between her lips'. "Just like… seemed fun."

Aubrey shrieks, and steals the box from Chloe's grasp. "You're insane. You're— you risked your life because it 'seemed fun'? I cannot deal with you anymore, Mitchell."

"Eh," Stacie says, seemingly unaffected by the whole thing. "I think smoking's hot."

"You want to be a doctor, Stace," Aubrey says, exasperated already with the girl. "How can you…"

"Look," she says, putting down the nail file and turning to face Aubrey. "It's not that smoking itself is attractive—it's actually pretty gross—it's just the look that comes with it. Smokers are usually badboys slash girls, and they're usually hot. I like the idea of it."

"That's…" She sighs. "Well, that's better than nothing."

"C'mere, Bree," Stacie says, beckoning her girlfriend over to her. "Let me give you a back rub."

Chloe flops down on the bed next to Beca, who has apparently recovered from the embarrassment of Chloe finding her cigarettes and has gone back to moping about having to study.

"I don't know," she whispers in Beca's ear. "I think you smoking a cigarette would be pretty sexy, Bec."

Beca's ears flush pink and then so does her face, and Chloe grins to herself.


End file.
